fachavsfechaWhat's the difference?

Which to use

“facha” and “fecha” are a confusable Spanish pair: similar on the page, but distinct in meaning, check the gloss before you choose.

#19,729
“facha” frequency rank
#658
“fecha” frequency rank
20387
confusion score

Side-by-Side Comparison

Feature facha fecha
Definition Aspecto y porte de una persona. Especificación de un día dentro de un calendario, tipicamente una fecha determina el año, el mes y el día dentro del mes.

Where the eye mixes facha and fecha

Muted = shared; highlighted = the visual trap. They share 4 letters in sequence. facha and fecha follow the identical consonant-vowel pattern (CVCCV). Same shape at a glance is often the real trap, independent of shared letters.

5 ch
facha
5 ch
fecha

Visual trap between facha and fecha

A purely visual mix-up. facha ([ˈfat͡ʃa]) and fecha ([ˈfet͡ʃa]) are said differently, so reading them aloud is the quickest way to catch the wrong one. On the page they stay close: they differ by a single letter - a in “facha” becomes e in “fecha”. Our composite confusion score for this pair is 20387, derived from the frequency rank of both members and their visual similarity.

facha is recorded at frequency rank #19,729, classified as anoun, pronounced [ˈfat͡ʃa]. fecha is at rank #658, tagged as anoun, pronounced [ˈfet͡ʃa].

Glosses for this pair are partially populated in our dataset, but the full side-by-side definitions above should still guide you to the right choice.

With a confusion score of 20387, this pair ranks #259,572 of 323,831 scored Spanish confusable pairs - a relatively easy-to-tell-apart pair.

Orthographic DNA of facha vs fecha

Shared letters: acfh. Private to "facha": -. Private to "fecha": e.

"facha" · 5 letters · shape CVCCV  ·  "fecha" · 5 letters · shape CVCCV

Known mistypes of this pair

  • facha ← afcha · facah · faccha · fachha · fahca · fcaha · ffacha
  • fecha ← efcha · fceha · fecah · feccha · fechha · fehca · ffecha

Frequently Asked Questions

Is swapping "facha" for "fecha" ever safe?
No. They are said differently ([ˈfat͡ʃa] versus [ˈfet͡ʃa]) and carry different meanings; reading the sentence aloud is usually enough to catch the wrong one.
In ordinary Spanish text, does "facha" or "fecha" show up more?
"fecha" is the more common of the two: it sits at frequency rank #658 in our Spanish list, against #19,729 for "facha". That is a wide gap, so in ordinary text the rarer spelling is the one worth double-checking.

After this comparison

Eye-level mix-up between "facha" and "fecha" is sorted above. Next: full entries or other pairs that share a letter shape.

  • Full dictionary entry for "facha" with definition, IPA, and generated misspellings. Word entry
  • Full dictionary entry for "fecha" - compare definitions side by side with the headword page. Word entry
  • This pair ranks #259,572 of 323,831 scored Spanish confusable pairs in this corpus vintage. Corpus statistics
  • "facha" and "fecha" also get mixed up with nearby pairs, the highest-scored neighbour is "faces vs facha". Nearby pair
  • Recorded mistypes exist for at least one side of this pair, useful when a spell-checker or OCR lands on the wrong form. See mistypes

Confusion rank #259,572 of 323,831 scored Spanish pairs, corpus vintage 2026-09-03, not spelling advice.

Source: Wiktionary (via kaikki.org) Structured Wiktionary extract

Source: FrequencyWords open word-frequency list